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Creative Resources in the Myths
Methodology
This section deals with technicalities in ideation and
production. It is a fore runner to the next which gives an
insight into the philosphico-emotional content of my work.
Here the discussion will be concerned with describing how the
project was carried through conception to actual execution of
individual works. This, it is hoped, will enhance further
appreciation of the implications of the project.
Technique
In the handling of techniques, efforts were made to transcend
banality. The experience was allowed to culminate in a process
of experimentation. Although various supports and grounds were
employed in the paintings, the application of colour – save for
watercolour – was generous. Thick coats of colour were deployed
with remarkable fluidity and spontaneity. The thickness of
colour allowed for further extra-coloral manipulation of medium,
especially through the graffito, scumbling and glaze techniques.
Colour Language
The language of colour is one that has to be mastered if the
painter must attain the goals of painting and those of his
individual emotions. For painting is “an intelligent
thought-provoking activity”. If the work of art must perform its
holistic functions, especially in relation to the audience, it
must be able to let in the observer at particular instances so
that he can step into it and momentarily become one with the
work. It is at this point that the principles of hermeneutics
encounters the demands of artistic subjectivity and underlines
Hans-Gadamer’s claim that “Every interpretation of the
intelligible that helps others to understanding has the
character of language” (Hans-Gadamer, 1977:98). Hence the work
of art is not only an object of hermeneutics but also
alternative language.
Having said that, the question then arises; how has this
character of art – of colour in particular – been used in the
pursuit of the goals of the project? I must admit that it is
rather difficult for one to begin to assess one’s usage of
colour language in the project. Since the work of art is to
some degree a dialogue, and in view of the hermeneutical
undertone of the project, colour elocution can only be measured
in relation to the effect created in the observer. But one
thing is certain. I have tried to avoid the near-mathematical
symbolism often resorted to by artists of our time. The
unwritten law which says that green signifies life and red,
danger, can only manacle the artist’s imagination. I have only
tried to charge colour with the fire of my own emotions and I
hope that in the process of the eternal dialogue which will
follow – between the work and its prospective audience -
multiversal, rather than universal, meanings will emerge from
the depths of the animated silence of the works.
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